Child illness charity soliciting in Las Vegas fibs about fundraising costs

Posted on by April 3, 2022
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fibs about fundraising costsThe recent telephone caller to the New To Las Vegas world headquarters said his name was Jake Williams. He was soliciting a contribution to the Childhood Leukemia Foundation, a charity based in far-away Brick, N.J.

Okay, I said, how much of what’s raised is spent on fundraising? The excited reply: “Fifty percent to the foundation after fundraising!” This was not a direct reply to my question, which asked for the amount of fundraising expense rather than what’s left over. But it was the mathematical equivalent of saying the fundraising efficiency ratio–the percent of donations remaining after subtracting fundraising costs–was 50%.

As I will explain below, that’s not a great percentage. But for CLF it’s not even close to the truth, based on its very own latest available financial filing, submitted under oath. The actual percentage easily calculated from the filing: 21%. Put another way, 79 cents of each donated dollar went right out the door in fundraising, leaving the foundation with only 21 cents of each dollar for the stated mission and other overhead.

I also will explain below why I think the response was so off it might have violated Nevada law and constituted an actionable deceptive trade practice.

Now, I admit I followed that old trial lawyer trick of not asking an important question I don’t know the answer to. With Jake Williams–probably a computer-generated voice controlled by a  human supervisor using soundboard technology–this was ridiculously easy to do. You see, CLF and I have a history together going back to BC (Before Covid). CLF’s financial efficiencies haven’t gotten better. In 2019 after being solicited two times on the phone I twice wrote up CLF’s poor financial efficiencies and other deficiencies. (You can read the posts here and here.) The second time, I even made CLF a candidate for my list of America’s Stupidest Charities. The criteria is simple: fundraisers that call asking for a donation despite a previous critical post by me. In that line of work, how much dumber can it get? You can find the list of nominee nearby. I don’t have to update it today with CLF because it’s already listed.

Let’s walk together through the numbers, plus some other issues. Continue reading →

What’s buried here, stays here: the few famous graves of Las Vegas (Part 4)

Posted on by March 20, 2022
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famous Las Vegas graves

Benny Binion couch crypt, Bunkers Eden Vale Memorial Park, Las Vegas

Welcome to Part 4 of my periodic series about the few famous graves of Las Vegas and how they came to be here. Part 1 dealt with athletes: boxer Sonny Liston, baseball pitcher Bo Belinsky and tennis great Pancho Gonzales. Part 2 described entertainers: movie icon Tony Curtis and TV star Redd Foxx. Part 3 concerned the Las Vegas Strip-creating Mob and associates, featuring the only big-name organized-crime boss planted here, Morris Barney (Moe) Dalitz. Plus Phyllis McGuire, the centerpiece of the famous McGuire Sisters singing act who was the girlfriend for 16 years of a famous Chicago mobster, Sam Giancana, who was murdered in his basement.

Let me repeat my operating thesis. Despite the area’s current population topping 2.3 million, the Las Vegas Valley is the eternal home of an extremely tiny number of individuals–by my count, no more than 20–who remain well known to folks outside the local area. I attribute this to several factors. Among them: Las Vegas’s relative youth as a city, being founded only in 1905, and the fact the population grew slowly and was still under 50,000 in 1950. You need a fair number of people dying over a significant period to produce famous graves. Then there’s the possibility that the stigma of Las Vegas for the longest time was such that prominent individuals and their families went elsewhere for that final act of interment. This certainly seems to be true of most local mobsters.

In this segment, I’m focusing on two characters integral to the development of Las Vegas as a gambling mecca with their own connections to organized crime. Continue reading →

In Las Vegas, faux cancer charity still solicits and still spends $0 on mission

Posted on by March 9, 2022
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fau cancer charityThe cold caller on the phone at the New To Las Vegas world headquarters said she was Diane Samson soliciting a gift for Breast Cancer Relief Committee PAC. I asked if her cause had complied with a new Nevada law requiring pre-registration for many fundraisers.

Yes, “Diane” said.

That wouldn’t be her only false statement.

I asked where the organization was based. “Windermere, Fla.,” she replied. The problem with “Diane’s” response is that on its website, American Coalition for Crisis Relief PAC, which is the parent of child Breast Cancer Relief Committee PAC and incorporates its financials, lists its address in Dallas, Tex. And for what it’s worth, my caller ID listed a number around Tucson, Ariz.

“Diane”–I’m using quotes around her name because she isn’t a real person but a computer-generated voice controlled by a human using soundboard technology–gave me an 800 number that she said I could call to get more information. I wrote it down and called. The number turned out to be that of an unrelated business.

Still, I already knew a lot–like the fact that American Coalition completely stiffed its donors on its stated mission of supporting political candidates for a sympathetic cause. That’s what a PAC, which stands for political action committee, is supposed to do. I call these kinds of PACs faux charities, although some watchdogs use stronger language.

You see, this wasn’t the first time that I had been called by Breast Cancer Relief Committee PAC. You can read my account of that last encounter in August 2021 by clicking here. But now child and parent are candidates for my list of America’s Stupidest Charities. The criteria is insanely simple: fundraisers that call me asking for money despite a previous critical article by me, usually focusing on terrible financial efficiencies. Seriously, folks, can it get dumber than that? You can see the other entries nearby. Continue reading →

Nevada governor gains wide fame from videotaped verbal assault in Las Vegas

Posted on by March 4, 2022
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verbal assault in Las Vegas

Screenshot from confrontation between Steve Sisolak (left) and Justin Andersch

It’s been five days since Nevada governor Steve Sisolak and his wife were accosted by a right-wing conspiracy pusher at a popular Las Vegas restaurant. With a cell phone camera running, he unleashed a string of profanities/racial taunts and declared, “We could string you up by a lamppost right now,” in a clip quickly posted on social media.

Now Sisolak, a moderate running-for-reelection Democrat so low-key he often travels around Nevada without security, suddenly has become one of the world’s most famous elected officials, at least for 15 minutes.

Okay, he’s no Biden, or even Putin, in terms of coverage. But a Google search for “Steve Sisolak and wife” returned 12,000 hits in the past week about the incident, many of them reprints of news accounts by the Associated Press. The far-flung outlets have included newspapers, TV stations, magazines (i.e. People) and websites across the country and in a number of foreign countries, including the U.K. and China. One YouTube clip of the incident has drawn nearly 15,000 views.

“Nevada governor threatened while dining in Las Vegas,” screamed a headline on the English-language website of the official Chinese outlet Xinhua. “Nevada governor and his wife accosted at restaurant by men shouting ‘racist threats,’ ” declared The Guardian of London. “Social video shows ‘racist’ taunts of Nevada governor, wife,” proclaimed a headline on the website of the Albany (NY) Times Union. (Sisolak’s wife, Kathy, was born in a rural Nevada city to Chinese parents and worked in public finance before marrying Sisolak after his election in 2018.) I’ve been asked about the incident by friends from distant places I lived in before becoming New To Las Vegas.

In my view, the episode says more about how the media works than it does about how politics works, and not just in Nevada. But that could change as we get closer to the November elections in which Republicans challenging incumbent Democrats are going to try to make COVID-19 the No. 1 issue. Continue reading →

Overlooking Las Vegas, the mystique–and myths–of Mount Charleston

Posted on by February 21, 2022
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Mount Charleston

Mount Charleston as seen last week from near the Las Vegas Strip

Sitting as it does in the Mojave Desert of southern Nevada, less than 300 miles from Mexico, the immediate Las Vegas area has pretty mild winters, with no snow most years. Except for this: A scan of the mountainous horizon surrounding the Las Vegas Valley shows one–and only one–snow-capped peak easily visible from the Las Vegas Strip. It actually stays white more than half the year well into the warm late spring and is rather noticeable. Tourists wearing T-shirts are amazed as they waddle from casino to casino.

I’m talking about Mount Charleston, or, as it’s officially called, Charleston Peak. Just 30 miles to the northwest, the 11,916-foot-high federally owned pinnacle–nearly two miles above the Strip and the highest point in southern Nevada–is a subject of mystique and myths.

As is so often the case about Las Vegas, both mystique and myths are interesting. Continue reading →

In Las Vegas, more phone calls from a faux charity using different names

Posted on by February 6, 2022
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faux charityBack in October, I wrote about United Women’s Health Alliance PAC. It’s a political action committee based in Washington, D.C., that emotionally solicits money on the phone for causes like females in uniform and health care sounding like it’s a charity–which it isn’t–and spends very little of what it receives on the stated missions. I predicted this PAC, which I call a faux charity, would simply ignore a new Nevada law known as Senate Bill 62 requiring it to first register and file financial statements before approaching would-be donors like me. UWHA-PAC is “betting on the sad track record of Nevada’s two charitable regulators,” I declared at the time.

I’m here to take a bow.

Last week, I received cold-call robocalls at the New To Las Vegas world headquarters from two d/b/a fronts that UHWA-PAC uses nationally, “Emma” speaking for Americans for Female Officers PAC (she’s the one who called in October) and “Simon” from Americans for Female Veterans PAC, a newbie. I use quotes because both were computer-generated voices using the obnoxious practice known as soundboard technology. I’ll get back to those calls in a bit.

More to my immediate point: I went on the listings website of the Nevada Secretary of State to see if UHWA-PAC, Americans for Female Officers PAC or Americans for Female Veterans PAC had registered with the state as the new law requires. Nope.

Then I called the main office in Carson City of the Nevada Secretary of State–one of those two regulators in Nevada–to see if maybe there was a lag in posting online new PAC registrations. Again, no. I was assured that all PAC registrations are immediately put up on the Internet. But the person I spoke with didn’t seem familiar with the new Nevada law requiring prior registration and financial filings for any organization soliciting within the state for causes benefiting, among other categories, law enforcement (female officers), public health (women’s health) and patriotism (female veterans).

I am shocked–NOT! Continue reading →